Verifying Restoration Prerequisites

Topic Last Modified: 2009-02-10

To perform any of the procedures in this section, first verify availability of the following:

• All required hardware and software for each procedure required to restore service.
• The backup and restoration plan for your organization and information from the completed worksheets from the appendices of this guide (or other equivalent information provided by your organization).
• All restoration tools on each server on which service is to be restored, as specified in this document and in the backup and restoration plan for your organization. The tools used in the restoration procedures covered in this guide are the same tools used to back up data and settings. For details about these tools, see Service Restoration Mechanisms.

Typically, a restoration process is required only in the event of a loss of service, so you generally would not need to perform the procedures in this section until then. However, it is necessary to complete some processes in advance, including the following:

• If your backup and restoration strategy includes a requirement to implement a separate, secondary site that can provide recovery capabilities (in the event of the loss of a site, such as might be caused by a prolonged power failure or a natural disaster), you need to complete the setup and validation of the standby servers in the secondary site. For details, see Setting Up a Secondary Site.
• To ensure that restoration processes work as expected, we recommend that you test the processes in advance. For details, see Validating Pool, Server, and Site Backups. Your backup and restoration strategy for your organization should identify the testing to be done.